I'd write you every second in this life that I have lived
you're present in my thoughts much more than I have ever been
With all of these illusions and the subtleties I see
I found you in the presence of the things that I believe
you struck me as a question I had never thought to ask
and left me with a longing for tomorrows that have passed
It doesn't make much sense, today is crippling my head
but what is this existence if you're gone, asleep or dead
I'm only ever sorry for the words I did not say
afraid of what they'd do because I couldn't get away
I kept you in a corner til you learned to disappear
and I would go in search of you to see if you were near
But keeping up your distance, I could only take a chance
for none of this resembles the extent of our romance
I'd put you in my pocket or forget that you were there
we could have been together but I lost you in a stare

My lover is ill and lies far away from my touch.

I challenge you to write a sadder sentence.

My lover is ill and lies far away from my touch.

Give it your best shot.

~mce

we were all born from
challenged ancestral thought -
refracting in such a way against
our flimsy souls
that would
build us up gradually:
    (from the drowning
           beta-fish to the asphyxiated
                                              dove).

showing us how absolutely
okay it was
to recognize
a distant gaze belonging
to one on the brink of another
terribly lonely silence.

coupled with sighting
a trembling bone structure --
we could find yet another
sign of “Get Me Out Of Here” or
“Those Walls Better Keep Their Distance”
without one or ten stigmas attached to the core.

auto-pilot would really do us all a favor if
we could think objectively for more than
a few seconds: throw a side of coping mechanisms
into the mix while we’re off creating the perfect
human. but god, just save more than a handful
of our loves tonight.

if only we could learn to note
the difference between a
barely-there sigh that screams
“This Is Only A Yawn” vs.
“More Than A Coffee Crash”

perhaps we’d all find each other well-off
and striving for that sense of unimaginable
hope we can see every poet clawing for;
trapped in the depths of their
own abyss. they can’t find
the EXIT sign. can you even
salvage a reading light?

this world can only flourish
outwards from here on out:
I swear to you.
if only we can pry that mind
open and teach it to love
a little bit more than
the revolving planets
in their universes.

da

this boy
eyes like hollow darkness
yet so intense
it draws me close
I want to get to know him
the way his pillow knows the back of his head
as he stares at the ceiling
at 4 am
wondering curiously
about life and death
and which one he belongs to

this boy
I want to put the light
back in his eyes

The world would be a better place
If girls weren't told that what they wore
Was the reason they were called ******
That it was their fault for being *****
When no one ever asks for it

The world would be a better place
When boys are told that its okay
To play with dolls and they won't be called gay
When a child wants to dress like the opposite gender
And adults won't tell them it's wrong

The world would be a better place
If my age didn't mean I know nothing
Even though I know how it feels
To lose and be abandoned, to feel like I'm not wanted
To be alone and have no job

The world would be a better place
If it didn't matter if I liked girls or guys
If my little brother didn't feel the need to hide
His true self from the world
If my sister didn't hurt herself and actually got help

The world would be a better place
If every child knew the love of a parent
And had a home with food
And a family to call their own

The way the world is now means it won't change based on a poem, won't stop based on one death
And won't recognize that even in chaos there is hope

This life isn't a contest of who wore it best.